Cricket South Africa (CSA) has brought its centrally contracted players home for the domestic summer, which starts later this week, leaving several County Championship teams without key overseas signings for the tail-end of the competition.
David Bedingham (Durham), Simon Harmer (Essex) and Kyle Verreynne (Nottinghamshire) will all miss the final three rounds of Championship fixtures as a result of CSA’s edict, with South Africa due to begin a packed home Test summer, which features series against Australia, Bangladesh and England, on October 9.Nottinghamshire announced on Monday that they have brought in New Zealand wicketkeeper-batter Mitch Hay as they look to secure back-to-back Division One titles. Durham, who are top of Division Two and eyeing the title, have already secured the services of Mayank Agarwal to replace Bedingham.
Essex said last month that they were in talks with CSA over Simon Harmer’s availability, since he is on a “hybrid” central contract, but have confirmed that he will not feature at Headingley this week. They are in the midst of an availability crisis, and will also be without Sam Cook and Jordan Cox (Test call-ups), as well as Charlie Bennett, Noah Thain, MacKenzie Jones and Simon Fernandes (all injured).
Worcestershire, meanwhile, have confirmed that they will be without allrounder Beyers Swanepoel for the rest of the season after he flew home “to attend to matters relating to his domestic cricket commitments”.Swanepoel was the subject of disciplinary action from CSA after his bizarre walk-out during a domestic 50-over final, and had his contract terminated by the Lions franchise. He has been replaced by Pakistani legspinner Usama Mir for their final three games.Elsewhere, Gloucestershire have signed the young Barbados-born fast bowler Che Simmons from Warwickshire on loan ahead of a permanent move.